Democratization, Institutions, and the Private Financial Returns to Socialist Schooling in Central and Eastern Europe 1938–2017

How do democratic institutions influence the returns to schooling obtained under socialism? Using Survey of Health, Aging, and Retirement in Europe data for 20,821 individuals who recall earnings from 52,005 jobs in 13 Central and Eastern European countries during 1938–2017, I link indicators of democratic institutional quality and compulsory schooling laws. Estimating returns to schooling interacted with institutional quality by instrumental variables, I find that the causal returns to schooling fall as electoral democratic quality increases, a finding consistent with democratization widening educational access. In contrast, judicial institutional quality does not influence the causal returns to schooling.